No public statements

"If it's a national issue, the CEO must be involved, otherwise he's saying he doesn't care," said Jonathan Bernstein, of Bernstein Crisis Management. PR Week, a public relations trade journal, called Bernstein "one of the 22 people in the world you should have on your speed dial in case of crisis."

Instead of putting Smith out front, ChoicePoint has relied on the low-profile duo of James Lee, the company's marketing director, and Chuck Jones, its public relations officer.

"Derek being the chairman and CEO, I can see why people would want to talk with him," Jones said Friday. "But he's really our strategy person, not the spokesman for this."

Whereabouts unknown

That's about as clear a response as ChoicePoint has when pressed on why Smith has not come forward. It was even unclear whether Smith was at the headquarters.

"I haven't seen him in the halls today," Jones said when asked about Smith's whereabouts on Wednesday.

Al Ries of the Ries & Ries marketing consulting firm in Atlanta said that, in a public relations crisis, "the CEO should come forward immediately, get on radio and TV and apologize. ... You have to take responsibility publicly."

"If your goal is to lead and to maintain credibility and long-term shareholder value, you lead," said Hulus Alpay, senior vice president at Makovsky & Co., a New York public relations and crisis management firm.

"If the goal is to cover your tail, that's a different agenda."

Also an opportunity

A public relations crisis can be an opportunity, said Alpay.

"The classic case was Tylenol, when the company adopted the mantra of 'we are going to protect the public at all costs,' " he said. The pain reliever was temporarily removed from the market because of fears of product tampering.

"And they put the CEO out there as a visible face of the company. You can flip that around for ChoicePoint."

Bernstein said the best course when a wrong has occurred is "to do a mea culpa, completely and with an expression of sympathy and compassion. If they had done this as quickly as possible, you could make it into a one- or two-day news event."

Jones said ChoicePoint's plan has been to say "first and foremost that ChoicePoint was sorry that it happened and going from there into what the potential impact would be on any individual person."

The company has emphasized that the identity thieves used stolen identities to pose as legitimate customers. ChoicePoint says it has since stiffened its screening process.